L.A. Times should shut off its presses, Politico should network, and other advice from Jeff Jarvis

What would Jeff Jarvis do? On Monday night, I asked the CUNY journalism professor and new-media evangelist how he would advise various news organizations that are struggling with old business models or experimenting with new ones. It was a rapid-fire exercise, and Jarvis, sporting a What Would Google Do? pin on his lapel, gamely offered his best elevator pitch for each company.

Q: If you were advising the L.A. Times, what would you advise they do going forward right now?

Jeff Jarvis: I think concentrating on local, local, local, which they’re doing. Number one. And number two, create networks where they can’t do it all themselves and become more collaborative.

Q: Go web-only? Now or—

Jarvis: I think so. Somebody is going to, and we have to learn. So if the L.A. Times can do it, it would show the way for most everybody. And I think the L.A. Times could succeed at it in California, and that would be an important ray of sunshine and hope for the whole rest of the journalism business.

Q: If you’re Politico, making money some months, making money not other months, paying a lot of money for the journalists?

Jarvis: Yeah, again, I think Politico is kind of already a network and could become a network of top bloggers. I’m surprised that The Washington Post or Politico or The Guardian, for my work, or the Times hasn’t tied together the best political bloggers in networks. And I mean quality. But then sell against that and take a piece of all that and support that, so you don’t have to do everything with your own staff. It’s a more scalable method, I think.

Q: What would that look like, a network like that?

Jarvis: I think it would look like going to — I’m trying to think of — just Blogger A is brought to you with the advertising sale of Politico here. Politico is supporting their content. That blogger is, in turn, promoting Politico. It’s the Glam model brought to serious journalism.

Jarvis: Yeah, I mean Nick loves to wear the hairshirt and act as if the world is falling down, but I think Nick’s doing very well, and he just is constantly adjusting and trying new models and finding the revenue to do things. His original goal was never to create a huge number of sites. He wanted to be the Condé Nast of online, the Si Newhouse of online. He has a few fewer than that, but Si’s culling magazines, too.

Q: So, Talking Points Memo, making money but not rolling in it. If you’re someone who wants to try to recreate the TPM model, is it possible?

Jarvis: Yeah, I think so. I think it’s possible against other niches. So TechCrunch covers tech, PaidContent covers the content business, and so on and so on. It’s all about grabbing your niche. The Internet does make a level playing field, and the way to stand out is by specializing and doing things really well.

Jarvis: I think it does. But the way it’s gonna have a chance is if other news organizations hire GlobalPost journalists and help support them in place. GlobalPost alone can’t afford all these journalists, but the industry can, and if the industry trusts GlobalPost to find the best people, curate the best people, then I think there’s a chance that a good number of them could make a living.

Jarvis: Yeah, I’m conflicted all up and down, but my students are going to work on The Local at the Times. I think what’s important about that is it’s The New York Times, of all places, trying to create a platform to help others than the Times’ journalists do journalism. I think that’s important.

Jarvis: I think ProPublica and foundation support is a slice of a new pie. They can’t support all the big newspapers, they can’t support all of journalism, but they can contribute journalism. So the fact that ProPublica has had more than one story in The New York Times is a way that ProPublica is, in essence, subsidizing The New York Times. And that’s a good thing.

Seward, Z. (2009, Mar. 12). L.A. Times should shut off its presses, Politico should network, and other advice from Jeff Jarvis. Nieman Journalism Lab. Retrieved March 19, 2018, from http://www.niemanlab.org/2009/03/la-times-should-shut-off-its-presses-politico-should-network-and-other-advice-from-jeff-jarvis/

Chicago

Seward, Zachary M.. "L.A. Times should shut off its presses, Politico should network, and other advice from Jeff Jarvis." Nieman Journalism Lab. Last modified March 12, 2009. Accessed March 19, 2018. http://www.niemanlab.org/2009/03/la-times-should-shut-off-its-presses-politico-should-network-and-other-advice-from-jeff-jarvis/.